Headley also visited Lucknow, Ahmedabad

Bharti Jain, ET BureauNov 11, 2009, 04.58am IST

NEW DELHI: David Coleman Headley, the LeT terror operative arrested by the FBI on charges of plotting attacks in India and Denmark, had visited Lucknow and Ahmedabad, apart from Mumbai, during his nine trips to India between 2006 and April 2009.

The security agencies here are now confirming whether Headley was using the visa facilitation agency he operated from Mumbai as a cover to recruit men for the Lashker-e-Toiba. The Mumbai police have also been asked to check if he was sending these LeT recruits to the US to man-sleeper cells there.

It be recalled that Mumbai and Ahmedabad have been a favourite recruitment ground for homegrown terror outfits

such as Indian Mujahideen, which had offered logistical support to the Lashker-e-Toiba to carry out several terror strikes in 2008. The Mumbai and Gujarat police had busted modules of Indian Mujahideen in the aftermath of the serial blasts in Ahmedabad, Jaipur and Delhi in 2008.

According to sources in the security establishment, Headley had secured a multiple-entry Indian business visa after changing his name from Daood Gilani to Headley, which left little scope for the authorities here to suspect his intentions. He ran a dummy visa facilitation agency from an office in Tardeo, Mumbai, and visited India nine times, the last being in April 2009.

The investigators are now probing the records of the visa facilitation agency to find out the identities and whereabouts of the people he had interacted with and helped get a US/Canadian visa. This will help check if his clientele were recruits meant to spread terror not only in India but also in US.